Oh one other thing I should mention is that our house is a lot smaller than the other frats' houses which also lessens someone's desire to go to our house for stuff I feel.

Good luck! And I just want to re-iterate how important it is not to let this status stuff get to you. I've seen collegiates too many times let their Greek reputation really affect their self-esteem, both for the upside to the point of being overly-cocky, and for the worse.

It's really important that you be involved in things outside of the Greek system. As great as it is to be really devoted to your house and improving your chapter's reputation, you need to make sure that you're not attaching an unhealthy amount of your own self-esteem to the status of your house. I'm speaking from experience, and I was kind of amazed what a weight was lifted when I graduated. I was super involved in my chapter, and I wish I had been more involved in non-Greek activities on campus.

Be careful with the non-NPC mixers. This can be great to get your name out there as nice fun guys, but it can also piss the NPC women off. If you do have such a mixer, make sure it works exactly like a mixer with an NPC group would as far as alcohol, third party vendors etc are concerned.

My daughter was a social chair for her sorority last year, so I'll give you her input (she's currently enjoying being a newly graduated lazy bum and doesn't want to type anything again ever at the moment. ).

This is just her personal preference, but she said she didn't want phone calls or emails- she wanted texts. If she knew that for some reason, her sorority didn't want to do something with a particular fraternity (popularity of the fraternity, by the way, wasn't usually the reason for this), or couldn't do something because of timing issues, it was easier for her to deal with that via text. Phone calls where she had to say no she found awkward and texts prevented that awkwardness. For that same reason, she wasn't hyped on getting together for coffee, etc although she did it from time to time with some social chairs (usually after she had already said yes to an event and they needed to plan).

She said persistence is good, but there is a fine line between persistance and desperate - sort of the same line that would exist with dating. She said she personally wouldn't be super comfortable with someone showing up at the door and in her case it wouldn't have been effective since she didn't live in the house most of the time she was social chair.

She did agree with a lot of other suggestions that have been made so far and added a few.

1) Yes, go and serenade at pre-chapter dinners. While you're there, the social chair should introduce himself, leave his number, and suggest that you'd love to do something with them.

2) DON"T leave it up to the sororities to plan something. Call them with a plan already made or offer to help plan something together. Do something in conjunction with another fraternity.

If you have a mixer or unofficial - and they are hosting at one of their places - offer to stay and help clean up. She was so impressed with a new fraternity on their campus that came back the next morning to help pick up her apartment after a mixer. Yes, she put them on the schedule again - quickly.

3) Show up to philanthropies, make sure you are there with big numbers and get involved in them. If you participate in something like, for instance, a Mr. Greek contest - go all out and REALLY work at it. Impress!

4) Ask them over for dinner.

5) Have an BIG event at the start of the year - dance, BBQ, whatever and invite EVERYONE(okay, not literally everyone) - campus wide. It's a good rush event for you, it helps sororities to get to know you in a comfortable atomsphere, and you get to know girls that might be rushing before they get into a sorority and get "locked in" to certain fraternities their sorority might hang out with. If those new girls like you - they will start pushing their own social chair to do stuff with you.

One of the fraternities on her campus also has helped freshmen move in every year. Yeah, they focused mostly on helping the girls. Because of this, she liked them from the start and remembered them when she went to plan functions. That same group planned a campus-wide flag football tournament the year before that a bunch of sororities participated in.

6) Yes, invite groups/organizations over that aren't sororities. A fraternity at her first campus invited the cheerleaders over for dinner (before she had joined a sorority). She went back to hang out several times after that and as she met sorority girls throughout the year, she had good things to say about that group. Also, two of the girls on her team were already in sororities and THEY had good things to say about that group to their sisters.

7) Bring over cookies, food, send cards etc. One of the fairly new fraternities on her campus sent candy and a card to every sorority on Valentine's Day.

8) The minute I read to her the part about a lot of the guys in your fraternity having girlfriends, she said, "Yeah, and that's part of the problem, probably."

Her experience has been that if a lot of the guys in a fraternity are in relationship they either aren't too interested in socials/mixer or they don't show up for them or if they do show up they stand by the wall. Because of this, she suggests focusing on your freshman/sophomore guys who are less likely to be in relationships and make sure everyone who comes is motivated to show up and socialize (and you're right - this doesn't mean hooking up. It just means be friendly and have fun).

Hope that helps.

ETA: Oh my goodness, this ended up being way longer than I intended - apologies.

It also depends on your campus culture. When I was in school, every sorority would put an ad in the Daily Illini that said something like "We look forward to our exchanges with the following fraternities", and so it was just as much about bragging when a good house gave you a mixer as it was actually having fun with the guys.

It seems intuitive that you would want to start with the house that is most on your level, but that actually may not be the case. It may be that a mid-level sorority can deflect possible gossip about mixing with your fraternity better than a sorority that is already struggling to recruit.

That said, if you are persistent enough with any group, they should at least give it a whirl with you guys.

Yes, our house. Most houses are pretty large/nice looking. Ours is smaller and not as exciting for a sorority girl concerned with prestige and money...

I don't think sororities brag about it that directly here but they definitely care about the status. I'd say we want to mix with the sororities more on our level because we'd enjoy it more as opposed to mixing with a "better" sorority that may give us good publicity but maybe not the best event for us.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LAblondeGPhi

Good luck! And I just want to re-iterate how important it is not to let this status stuff get to you. I've seen collegiates too many times let their Greek reputation really affect their self-esteem, both for the upside to the point of being overly-cocky, and for the worse.

It's really important that you be involved in things outside of the Greek system. As great as it is to be really devoted to your house and improving your chapter's reputation, you need to make sure that you're not attaching an unhealthy amount of your own self-esteem to the status of your house. I'm speaking from experience, and I was kind of amazed what a weight was lifted when I graduated. I was super involved in my chapter, and I wish I had been more involved in non-Greek activities on campus.

I definitely agree with what you said. I actually am involved with a ton of stuff outside of my frat (most guys in it are) which is what I think makes us so unique. I'm very happy I'm in my frat and I love my brothers, I just wish we had better sorority relations, that's all. The status thing does get to me in that sense but then I try to get over it by thinking about the good things I get out of it anyway.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MysticCat

Actually, you lost me with the judgmentalism here:

Sorry, again. In fact many of the cool guys in my frat are engineers. Just on my campus, the frats that are dorky/off the radar (even more than us) are full of the less outgoing people and a lot of them happen to be engineers although obviously they are full of other guys who aren't engineers.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 33girl

Be careful with the non-NPC mixers. This can be great to get your name out there as nice fun guys, but it can also piss the NPC women off. If you do have such a mixer, make sure it works exactly like a mixer with an NPC group would as far as alcohol, third party vendors etc are concerned.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean here... Could you clarify?

Quote:

Originally Posted by AXOmom

Gr33kfan,

My daughter was a social chair for her sorority last year, so I'll give you her input (she's currently enjoying being a newly graduated lazy bum and doesn't want to type anything again ever at the moment. ).

This is just her personal preference, but she said she didn't want phone calls or emails- she wanted texts. If she knew that for some reason, her sorority didn't want to do something with a particular fraternity (popularity of the fraternity, by the way, wasn't usually the reason for this), or couldn't do something because of timing issues, it was easier for her to deal with that via text. Phone calls where she had to say no she found awkward and texts prevented that awkwardness. For that same reason, she wasn't hyped on getting together for coffee, etc although she did it from time to time with some social chairs (usually after she had already said yes to an event and they needed to plan).

She said persistence is good, but there is a fine line between persistance and desperate - sort of the same line that would exist with dating. She said she personally wouldn't be super comfortable with someone showing up at the door and in her case it wouldn't have been effective since she didn't live in the house most of the time she was social chair.

She did agree with a lot of other suggestions that have been made so far and added a few.

1) Yes, go and serenade at pre-chapter dinners. While you're there, the social chair should introduce himself, leave his number, and suggest that you'd love to do something with them.

2) DON"T leave it up to the sororities to plan something. Call them with a plan already made or offer to help plan something together. Do something in conjunction with another fraternity.

If you have a mixer or unofficial - and they are hosting at one of their places - offer to stay and help clean up. She was so impressed with a new fraternity on their campus that came back the next morning to help pick up her apartment after a mixer. Yes, she put them on the schedule again - quickly.

3) Show up to philanthropies, make sure you are there with big numbers and get involved in them. If you participate in something like, for instance, a Mr. Greek contest - go all out and REALLY work at it. Impress!

4) Ask them over for dinner.

5) Have an BIG event at the start of the year - dance, BBQ, whatever and invite EVERYONE(okay, not literally everyone) - campus wide. It's a good rush event for you, it helps sororities to get to know you in a comfortable atomsphere, and you get to know girls that might be rushing before they get into a sorority and get "locked in" to certain fraternities their sorority might hang out with. If those new girls like you - they will start pushing their own social chair to do stuff with you.

One of the fraternities on her campus also has helped freshmen move in every year. Yeah, they focused mostly on helping the girls. Because of this, she liked them from the start and remembered them when she went to plan functions. That same group planned a campus-wide flag football tournament the year before that a bunch of sororities participated in.

6) Yes, invite groups/organizations over that aren't sororities. A fraternity at her first campus invited the cheerleaders over for dinner (before she had joined a sorority). She went back to hang out several times after that and as she met sorority girls throughout the year, she had good things to say about that group. Also, two of the girls on her team were already in sororities and THEY had good things to say about that group to their sisters.

7) Bring over cookies, food, send cards etc. One of the fairly new fraternities on her campus sent candy and a card to every sorority on Valentine's Day.

8) The minute I read to her the part about a lot of the guys in your fraternity having girlfriends, she said, "Yeah, and that's part of the problem, probably."

Her experience has been that if a lot of the guys in a fraternity are in relationship they either aren't too interested in socials/mixer or they don't show up for them or if they do show up they stand by the wall. Because of this, she suggests focusing on your freshman/sophomore guys who are less likely to be in relationships and make sure everyone who comes is motivated to show up and socialize (and you're right - this doesn't mean hooking up. It just means be friendly and have fun).

Hope that helps.

ETA: Oh my goodness, this ended up being way longer than I intended - apologies.

I appreciate the long response! The one thing that worries me about texts is that if I'm going to go the electronic route, I'd prefer email since it's easier to write a nice message. You can't really fit that much into a text, and I feel like it wouldn't look very classy. I do agree that calling to meet up may be awkward if they are really not interested, which is a dilemma I'm having with implementing that idea.

In terms of having an idea before contacting, what if I suggest a party mixer to a sorority that would only be interested in a dinner instead and I offer a dinner to sorority that wouldn't have minded doing a party mixer? How do I know what to offer?

Although guys are in relationships, most of our new guys are still single so we could definitely make something work (guys in relationships are allowed to talk to girls still too haha). Thanks for your help!

1) Regarding emails versus texts - again, she said that you need to think of it like dating - email's, unless it was formal event of some kind, is a bit much for a mixer - this is an area where she said a text comes off as more of a casual, play it cool, no big deal kind of thing. Sending an involved email for a mixer would come across like a guy asking you out for coffee and showing up in a suit with roses and candy - it's overkill and too formal for the event. Maybe that's just her and other social chairs would feel differently, but for the simple mixers....keep it simple. Don't sweat it this much.

2) When in doubt, start with the dinner. If they like your guys, they will stay and hang out. Move to a mixer for the next thing.

3) I don't mean to suggest that guys in relationships can't be social (she mentioned her BF did a great job of going to socials and being social while respecting her), BUT there were times when they did things with some fraternities and if a lot of the guys had GF's they seemed to stick by the wall and not be terribly social. Just be sure your guys understand that all they have to do is be friendly and meet people- regardless of their status.

4) If the mixer thing is stressing you out (in terms of how to ask, when to ask etc.) she emphasized starting with big "invite everybody" parties and have a lot of them. Rent out a venue if your house is too small or use a live-out. Takes the pressure off of you in the sense that no one has to say yes or no - they just have to show up. It doesn't have to be a theme. Just invite people. If your guys have GF's have them invite their friends over. Have date-dash cocktail parties or dance parties. Again, keep it simple and don't sweat it at first.

Okay, that wasn't much shorter. Sorry. I'm an English teacher. I can't shut up.

1) Regarding emails versus texts - again, she said that you need to think of it like dating - email's, unless it was formal event of some kind, is a bit much for a mixer - this is an area where she said a text comes off as more of a casual, play it cool, no big deal kind of thing. Sending an involved email for a mixer would come across like a guy asking you out for coffee and showing up in a suit with roses and candy - it's overkill and too formal for the event. Maybe that's just her and other social chairs would feel differently, but for the simple mixers....keep it simple. Don't sweat it this much.

2) When in doubt, start with the dinner. If they like your guys, they will stay and hang out. Move to a mixer for the next thing.

3) I don't mean to suggest that guys in relationships can't be social (she mentioned her BF did a great job of going to socials and being social while respecting her), BUT there were times when they did things with some fraternities and if a lot of the guys had GF's they seemed to stick by the wall and not be terribly social. Just be sure your guys understand that all they have to do is be friendly and meet people- regardless of their status.

4) If the mixer thing is stressing you out (in terms of how to ask, when to ask etc.) she emphasized starting with big "invite everybody" parties and have a lot of them. Rent out a venue if your house is too small or use a live-out. Takes the pressure off of you in the sense that no one has to say yes or no - they just have to show up. It doesn't have to be a theme. Just invite people. If your guys have GF's have them invite their friends over. Have date-dash cocktail parties or dance parties. Again, keep it simple and don't sweat it at first.

Okay, that wasn't much shorter. Sorry. I'm an English teacher. I can't shut up.

Thanks again! Anyone have any input on the email/texting situation?

Dinner sounds like a good way to start.

We do have open parties for people to come to and they're usually pretty good/crowded, just sorority girls don't really come unless they have friends in the frat. If we are having something going on for a weekend, surely a sorority will be able to find parties at the "better" frats or will have mixers etc. so this idea has already been tried I guess :/. So I think we need to start with more personal things to expect them to show up.

The grab-a-date is a good idea. The attached guys can bring their girl. All the unattached guys can grab a friend (who is in a sorority) and help get the word out about what a fun group of guys you are. I recommend something easy like BBQ or flat out goofy like disco bowling or paintball.

If the sororities are all a lot bigger - you might try having a Swap. Only invite their new member class for a fun no alcohol activity like an ice cream social

[QUOTE=gr33kfan;2135421]Thanks again! Anyone have any input on the email/texting situation?

Dinner sounds like a good way to start.

We do have open parties for people to come to and they're usually pretty good/crowded, just sorority girls don't really come unless they have friends in the frat. If we are having something going on for a weekend, surely a sorority will be able to find parties at the "better" frats or will have mixers etc. so this idea has already been tried I guess :/. So I think we need to start with more personal things to expect them to show up.[/QUOTE]

Is the problem that its only girls that already have friends in the fraternity and you want to meet more/new girls? In that case, you need to publicize your events better and encourage the girls who do come to bring friends.

Whether or not they would choose another event over yours would depend, I guess, on your campus culture. On her campus, fraternities tended to each have some type of "BIG" event or events they do but not every fraternity has a "BIG" event or huge party every weekend, so not many overlap. Other fraternties and sororities may have smaller parties on the same weekend as some fraternities big party, but girls will head to the "BIG" event first and then go to the smaller parties later or vice-versa. In other words - they don't choose between yours and someone else's -they make the rounds, so unless things are radically different on your campus (they may be), they aren't choosing between you and someone else for these things - it just adds you to the list of things they will do that night as opposed to ignoring you entirely.

She agreed with HQWest's suggestions and added one - a weekend date dash to the beach/mountains/lake/river etc...Rent some cabins/houseboats/a small hotel or block or rooms and take friends/dates/girlfriends. Very few people will say no to hanging out with friends at any one of these places over a weekend.

Most NPC sororities have rules that mixers must be alcohol-free, or if not alcohol-free, held at a third-party vendor like a club which then takes responsibility for carding underagers, etc. When this rule first came out, at some schools, there was a problem with non-NPC groups like service sororities or dance teams not having these rules...so naturally the fraternities started blowing off NPC groups to mix with these other groups because girls drinking are more fun than girls not drinking.

I won't ask if the NPC groups at your school follow this or not, that's not the point. The point is if you mix with a non-NPC don't take advantage of their lack of rules. If NPC groups have (example) a rule that mixers must end at midnight, then you should end your mixer with the flag team at midnight as well...even though they don't have that rule.

We do have open parties for people to come to and they're usually pretty good/crowded, just sorority girls don't really come unless they have friends in the frat. If we are having something going on for a weekend, surely a sorority will be able to find parties at the "better" frats or will have mixers etc. so this idea has already been tried I guess :/. So I think we need to start with more personal things to expect them to show up.[/QUOTE]

Is the problem that its only girls that already have friends in the fraternity and you want to meet more/new girls? In that case, you need to publicize your events better and encourage the girls who do come to bring friends.

Whether or not they would choose another event over yours would depend, I guess, on your campus culture. On her campus, fraternities tended to each have some type of "BIG" event or events they do but not every fraternity has a "BIG" event or huge party every weekend, so not many overlap. Other fraternties and sororities may have smaller parties on the same weekend as some fraternities big party, but girls will head to the "BIG" event first and then go to the smaller parties later or vice-versa. In other words - they don't choose between yours and someone else's -they make the rounds, so unless things are radically different on your campus (they may be), they aren't choosing between you and someone else for these things - it just adds you to the list of things they will do that night as opposed to ignoring you entirely.

She agreed with HQWest's suggestions and added one - a weekend date dash to the beach/mountains/lake/river etc...Rent some cabins/houseboats/a small hotel or block or rooms and take friends/dates/girlfriends. Very few people will say no to hanging out with friends at any one of these places over a weekend.

I think our campus culture is one where people are choosing between events and don't pick us. Also, most frats here don't really have "BIG" events like you are describing, at least not on campus.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 33girl

Most NPC sororities have rules that mixers must be alcohol-free, or if not alcohol-free, held at a third-party vendor like a club which then takes responsibility for carding underagers, etc. When this rule first came out, at some schools, there was a problem with non-NPC groups like service sororities or dance teams not having these rules...so naturally the fraternities started blowing off NPC groups to mix with these other groups because girls drinking are more fun than girls not drinking.

I won't ask if the NPC groups at your school follow this or not, that's not the point. The point is if you mix with a non-NPC don't take advantage of their lack of rules. If NPC groups have (example) a rule that mixers must end at midnight, then you should end your mixer with the flag team at midnight as well...even though they don't have that rule.

I guess I'm wondering that if in the past social chairs haven't been able to get something to happen between us and sororities, what's going to make them change their minds? How do we stick out enough for them to want to include us in their already busy schedules?

I guess I'm wondering that if in the past social chairs haven't been able to get something to happen between us and sororities, what's going to make them change their minds? How do we stick out enough for them to want to include us in their already busy schedules?

Be nice guys (without being bootlicking pussies). Be visible. Be sociable. Support sororities in their endeavors. Don't go overboard trying to appeal to the "top" sororities. You will come off like 90% of the fraternity (and non-fraternity) dudes on campus, someone who wants to sleep with a girl in a popular sorority just to get a notch on their belt. Concentrate on the girls who will be more likely to accept your invitations and just have a fun time without constantly comparing you to FratttyFrat ABC.

More than anything...your social chair should be the cutest, nicest, most sociable, most visible on campus member of your fraternity. This works wonders. Even if this guy already has an office...even an exec board office...the invitations and contacts should come from him.

As far as events with the sorority's new member class only...I thought this was considered hazing (pledges doing something initiated sisters don't have to do, and putting the pledges "on display" for fraternity men). I would stay away from this unless it is an established tradition on your campus and the sororities' HQs look the other way about it.

Ditto everything that has already been said, ESPECIALLY attending philanthropies. I can't think of anything that has my won my chapter's allegiance quicker than a fraternity showing up in full force to our event. If your brothers show up in letters with a smile girls will notice (one house came to our event this year in matching shirts. It was humanly impossible not to notice them.) Likewise, if you get paired with a sorority for any sort of competition be the BEST partners you can be. There are plenty of "top" houses on my campus that aren't worth squat as partners and nothing is more frustrating. A couple of other things that haven't been touched on as much yet...
1. Do you ever plan community service events with sororities? This is a fairly common thing on my campus and seems generally successful at improving chapter relationships. It's a nice way for people in relationships to meet members in other chapters in a "friendzone" setting and everyone has hours to get done anyways. My boyfriend is the service chair for his chapter and has made a point to arrange things with sororities that they're not on great terms with as a way to gradually build up ties. The last one led to the group all going out to dinner together afterwards. Also, if you can build up a reputation of being reliable and always sending a solid number of guys then sorority service chairs will pick you every time over chapters that are "fratty" but flaky.
2. How do you interact with other campus leaders? Do you have anyone on IFC Council? Is your president close with any of the other presidents? Close ties with other social chairs is great, but I've noticed that it's common for chapter to to chapter relations to happen from the top down on my campus. It's always interesting to see who mixes with who after the President\ IFC & Panhel Council retreat. Now don't get me wrong, a chapter leader should never force their brothers\sisters to mix with someone, and if the chapter is deadset against it they probably can't anyways. But more than once I've seen a leader come back to a chapter and say "This weekend I met the President of XYZ. He\she was awesome, why don't we ever hang out with them?" That endorsement can be enough to get a chapter to give you a chance, if only by starting out with something small like a service event or a dinner.
3. Oregon is big on dinner exchanges. Social chairs will coordinate and decide who is hosting. Our chapter sizes are on the larger side so it's by no means an all-house event . Due to our smaller dining room we usually go over to the fraternities. We'll send around 30 girls and bring desert if they're providing dinner. Sometimes they have cheesy themes like "boardgame" night, trivia night, etc. These almost universally lead to a function with the chapter afterwards.
4. Come recruitment time offer LOTS of encouragement and don't be afraid to volunteer to be guinea pigs for sororities during work week. I can't speak for everyone but when a fraternity stepped up to do that for us this year my chapter was THRILLED for another opportunity to practice conversation. Sorority women put an inordinate amount of work into recruitment and anytime fraternity men show an appreciation for that, be it with cookies and nice card or just some words of encouragement, we notice.
5. People above are right in that a new member pledge class only thing would be hazing (at least on my campus) but whenever possible try to put your new members on display and encourage them to get to know other new members. It's easier to show new additions to the Panhellenic world that you're nice guys worth socializing with than it is to change the minds of upperclassmen.
Good luck!